What the foremost expert on addiction had to say may not appear to be political on the surface but the implications are not only deeply political but revolutionary and controversial.  Dr. Maté debunks both the punitive law enforcement and current medical approaches to the problem and treatment of addiction because as he reveals, addiction is neither a moral defect or a brain disease.  He says addiction is a natural adaptation to suffering caused by early life trauma and as he laid out in a recent talk at Kane Hall, a "sick society".
He says that all of his patients suffer from childhood trauma and in a broader sense, especially in the US, we are programmed to believe that happiness comes from “getting” whereas as he says, happiness actually comes from “service”.   He said that as tribal animals we are biologically programmed this way.  I.e., our propaganda programming directly contradicts our biological programming.  This is the psychological underpinning of why North Americans are the most plagued by addictive behaviors which as he pointed out doesn't necessarily mean substance abuse.   Therefore neither approaches address the root causes of addiction which is a natural attempt to escape from pain which people are unable to deal with.  And this is why he has been one of the foremost proponents of a harm reduction model vs. the abstinence model embraced by both 12 step treatment programs and the prison industrial complex.
We couldn’t use the talk from the Kane Hall because as is so often the case, the PA system was constantly feeding back.  So we taped another talk at Rich Lang’s church.  This talk is a discussion between Dr. Maté and East Asian Medicine practitioner Rebekah Demirel and includes a discussion of the latest insights of Western medicine and the traditional wisdom of Eastern practices in relation to addiction and compares the difference.  I.e., treating symptoms vs. causes.
Gabor Gabor Maté, MD, is a physician, author, seminar leader, and acclaimed public speaker.  His bestselling books include Scattered, When the Body Says No, and Hold onto Your Kids. A former medical columnist for The Vancouver Sun and The Globe and Mail, he lives in Vancouver, BC.
Thanks to University Bookstore and University Temple United Methodist Church
Camera by Todd Boyle
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